Domain age as a ranking factor on Google

May 16, 2007

Domain age, as the name states, is determined by the age of your domain, being an Australian blogger with an Australian domain, this usually works to my advantage. I say this because Austrailan domains, unlike other TLDs, have a minimum registration time of two years hence locking in my minimum domain age at two years instead of one. Australian domain names also have a barrier for entry as there are restrictions on who can own one and for what reason it can be owned for, this gives Australian domain slightly more trusts than cheaper generic TLDs.

As this is a factor which is largely out of our control, I suggest that you don’t think about it too much. Domain age will come over time and you probably won’t even know what hit you when it does. I have seen a noticable jump in rankings after my older domain (Pixel Square Production) passed the two year age mark. I had implemented no SEO changes nor have I been actively adding links, so Google basically just decided that after two years, my domain was trusted more.

However, if you are really concerned with domain age, then I would recommend you look into purchasing expired / expiring domains, or buying an old domain name off digital point or namepros.Â You will notice that there are a lot of people selling domains, however you will need to carefully weed through all of them to find one with a name which would fit your purpose as well as demographics.

Note that you shouldn’t look at the page rank of the domain when purchasing. I say this as there are shady sellers who artificially inflate the domain’s page rank by adding a large amount of inbound links to them, however as soon as they sell the domain, those inbound links would disappear and the domain will lose its page rank.Â Only purchase a domain according to its merits, such as domain age, TLD, name as well as if it fits your purpose. You may also want to run a quick background check on the domain Via Google to see if there are any undesirable mentions linked to it.

6 Comments

Harry

Domain Age Factor is one of the important factors in ranking in SERP. Especially in Google Algorithm. Thatâ€™s why in buying and selling domains they are one of the factors of the price of the domain.The older the domain the better in SERP. This is the real scenario in ranking websites.

I don’t really think Google now gives high weightage to domain age. Had been they so, facebook, digg, technorati, etc would not have good SERP. Instead what I think is the popularity and traffic of website that really matters. People always measure the popularity in terms of PR. Google webmaster does not think so. They are of the opinion of not thinking too much about PR. So, PR is taking a back seat these days. In a fast changing Google’s algorithms inclined more towards universal search, being rigid over the PR as a strong measuring tool for your website shows an outdated thought. C’mmon, analyze the current trends and then put forth your opinion.

Domain age is only one of many different factors in Google’s ranking algorithm. It is true that newer domains are obtaining high rankings, but that is largely due to their link popularity (which as you mentioned above, is due to their growing popularity amongst internet users). I personally do not believe traffic has anything to do with Google rankings, as there does not seem to be any means for Google to quantify, let alone track that metric.

You are also right that viewing page rank as the only method of measuring SERPs ranking strength as being out dated, however having said that, PR is usually viewed as a very (and I mean very) vague way of measuring the potential ranking ability of a website on Google. It is by no means the only method an experienced SEO will view when gauging the page strengths of a website.

Just to refresh on the content of this post, as it is quite dated now, it is in relation to how the age of a specific domain helps the pages on that domain rank. Another way to think about this is like “credit rating”, usually people with no credit rating has a harder time of obtaining loans or credit whilst people with excellent credit ratings obtain loan/credit significantly easier than people with poor credit rating.

If you put that analogy into context, old domains with a perfect track record and credibility (in the form of link popularity) has it easier when it comes to rankings. On the contrary, old domains which have a poor track record will have it harder when it comes to rankings on Google, that is unless you clear it up with Google (by filling in the bloody reconsideration/reinclusion forms).

Brand new Domains do not have the added strengths of a good track record to be bestowed upon their credibility profile, hence will need to have substantial amount of inbound links to balance out the overall credibility of the website.

What a great article. I have searched for info on aged domains for ages and come up with nothing, let along something Australian based. Thanks very much for the info. If you have any additional info on how to find aged domains please send me an email.

Is there any future if someone starts a SEO consultancy firm for making money? What are the risk factors since Google recently changed its algorithm & it may keep on doing so in the future leaving behind no use of optimizing a website?